Deep Water Review – Slow & Pointless Like The Snails In It

The R-rated 2022 film ‘Deep Water’ starring Ben Affleck is so ridiculously bad, I binge-watched an entirely different new romantic series to cleanse my disappointment right after. Directed by Adrian Lyne, this ‘erotic-thriller’ is based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith. Don’t know about the book, but some porno flicks might have better plot progression than this adaptation.

Ben Affleck plays Vic, a filthy rich programmer who has already retired on the money made off a chip he developed, that’s being used by the U.S military in their drones. He has a beautiful, much younger wife Melinda (played by Ana De Armas) and an absolutely adorable little daughter Trixie. Vic’s perfect life has one problem – his wife is promiscuous and he pretends to be okay with it. But when some of his wife’s love-interests die, he becomes the primary suspect.

Except for the cute child actor Grace Jenkins, pretty much everybody plays an asshole in this film. So as an average viewer, it’s hard to care about rich privileged jerks doing pretentious shit and throwing fancy boring parties. All the ‘erotic’ scenes were mundane, fast-forwarded most of them. In-fact, the entire film was a snooze-fest, the pace is so slow, most viewers will run out of patience soon. If it weren’t for the programming bit and one ‘couple’s therapy’ joke, the story is right out of the 1980s – stale AF. There’s nothing ‘deep’ about it, instead you wonder why some of the supposedly intelligent characters behave like dumb-idiots. It’s not even like they are poor helpless individuals who cannot do better. Sigh.

Vic is the cliched ‘rich, handsome, intelligent but boring’ guy. The only thing he cares about is his daughter and snails. He has an entire greenhouse kind of room dedicated to raising snails, so he is a snail-dad. When a guest asks them if they are for eventual consumption, he says “The snails aren’t for eating. They’re not for anything.” Sure, it’s not like the snails are completely pointless, it’s just a novel hobby, to add to Vic’s ‘weird’ personality. A label he takes pride in. Whatever. Nobody cares.

The suspense is thread-bare and the climax was just as disappointing as the rest of the film. It’s like they don’t even try. Skip this okay, just watch some actual erotica if you want. It’s a 3/10 from me. Feels generous. (You can stream it on Disney+)